Category Archives: transit culture

Remembering why I ride

“What’s the Flux?” is a six-month, grant-funded project by KBCS radio that examines commuting in the Puget Sound region from a human level. I was fortunate enough to participate in the project; my interviews with reporter Yuko Kodama were broadcast earlier this month.

Ordinarily, I don’t like doing radio interviews. Time is limited, or the focus is political (which can feel more like a race to make your point than an actual dialog), or the host asks all the wrong questions. But this interview was a lot of fun. I talked with Yuko twice, for well over an hour each time (though fortunately, she edited my ramblings down to digestible segments), and I managed to explain — and as a result, reconnect with — most of what I love about the bus.

I’m sharing the recordings here in hopes that they will help you remember (or discover) what you love about sharing the ride. Also, because it lets me pretend like I have a podcast.

On buses and boundaries

Earlier this month, I wrote a short piece for Seattle’s Child about how Bus Nerd and I teach our kids to interact with strangers. Here’s a taste.

[We] don’t discourage our kids from talking to “strangers.” Like most parents, we have taught them never to go with a person they don’t know. But we also encourage and model safe and positive interactions, including making eye contact and greeting people, engaging in conversation, and helping those who need it.

We teach our kids how to recognize signs that someone is not safe to interact with: erratic behavior, inappropriate or aggressive language, invading personal space. And we empower them to decide what sort of interactions they’re comfortable with.

I certainly don’t have a magic bullet to protect my children (or anyone’s) from danger and violence. But the thing is, the more we isolate our kids and hide them away from the people they share the world with, the more disconnected and dangerous our communities become. We end up with fewer neighborhood friendships (and thus, more strangers), fewer “eyes on the street,” and lots more people in cars. And, as the number one killer of American children, cars are a significant threat to the safety of our communities.

Here’s to saying hi!

Art + buses + community = life (part II)

My former coworker, Kate, bus (and bike) mama extraordinaire, moved from Tacoma to St. Louis over the summer. Kate and her crew are so far enjoying the transit life in a city that offers service after 7 PM (ahem) and have wasted no time integrating themselves into their new community.

Last Saturday, they attended a birthday party for the Gateway Arch and painted a bus.

[O]n Saturday, October 24, children and adults [transformed] a 35-foot MetroBus into a rolling work of art that will travel on routes in St. Louis County and the City of St. Louis over the next year.

You guys. You guys.

How cool would it be to see a bus you helped paint rolling through your neighborhood? How cool would it be to ride on one? What a beautiful way to foster feelings of belonging and build community!

Transit agency/arts organization types who are reading: Make this happen in your area.

Power to the people

On Saturday, Bus Nerd and I went to see The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution at Northwest Film Forum. I learned many things from this film, one of which is that founding chair Bobby Seale was the best political candidate of all time.

During his 1973 campaign for mayor of Oakland, the man took his message directly to the people, Panther style.

Yes, please.

Though he wasn’t able to unseat Oakland’s incumbent mayor, Seale’s “long shot” candidacy, masterminded — along with the city council candidacy of Elaine Brown — by the ever resourceful Panther organization, earned him a second place finish in a nine-candidate contest. More importantly, it earned him a voice in the debate.

I have always been inspired by the dedication and sacrifice of the Black Panthers. The young people — average age of a member was between 18 and 20 — who joined the organization gave their whole selves to the cause. They risked personal safety. They sacrificed relationships. They shared resources, including living quarters. And they worked. Tirelessly. Sometimes around the clock.

The fruits of that tireless, dedicated labor were many: chapters in 38 cities (including Seattle), a newspaper with an international circulation of 250,000, a free breakfast program that fed 10,000 children per day at its peak, and free health clinics in cities across the country.

These young people were not willing to sit idle and hope hard for change. They stood up, took action, made mistakes, tried again. From their small corner of this country, they raised their voices loud enough for the whole world to hear.

Art + buses + community = life

If anything could cheer me right now, it is this goodness from the Twin Cities. (Thanks for sharing, Allison!)

CuriousCity TC is a project of Minneapolis artist Ricardo Levins Morales to put thought-provoking questions and images on Twin Cities (Minneapolis-Saint Paul, MN) city buses.

New posters will be installed on dozens of metro buses once a month from June through November 2015, culminating in a community event.

Viewers are encouraged to discuss the questions with other riders and to post responses on this site or on social media with the hashtag #CuriousCityTC.

Yes to art on buses! Yes to projects that encourage interaction and reflection. Yes to building community.

Love.

On busing and birthday parties (or, My brief encounter with a bus goddess)

One of the things I’ve come to accept about myself is that I have very few actual skills. I don’t know how to make stuff or fix stuff. (Shoot, I can barely troubleshoot a clogged toilet or hang a picture straight.) I can’t sing or draw or play an instrument. I can’t run or jump or catch. I fancy myself an “activist” but have essentially zero talent for leading people, or organizing, or motivating.

Friends, here is an exhaustive* list of the things I’m good at.

1) Writing
2) Babies
3) Riding the bus

Whether or not I feel good about my writing abilities depends on whether I’ve been able to produce anything I don’t hate (or, for that matter, anything at all) in the recent past. My baby-whispering skills do not extend to children over the age of three.

But my bus skills? They are legendary.

You cannot mess with me on my transit know-how. There are some people who could definitely crush me in the route knowledge category and others who win in the longevity department. But on the ground, I am the queen.

Or, at least I was.

Back in March, I took Chicklet to a birthday part for one of her classmates. (Have I mentioned how ridiculously easy it is riding the bus with one seven-year old? Seriously. Compared to what I’ve got going on these days, it’s like a freaking vacation.)

The party was at Seattle Children’s Museum, so we took the 8. It was on that 8 that we ran into the birthday boy and his mom, LaShaun. I knew as soon as I met LaShaun that she was a bus chick—and not just because she was on the bus. (One does not earn the title of bus chick by bus riding alone.) LaShaun was riding the bus to her kid’s birthday party.

The average non-car-owning parent of would have done one of the following on the occasion of her child’s birthday: 1) borrowed/rented a car or asked for a ride to facilitate an out-of-home birthday party, or 2) not hosted an out-of-home birthday party. (I fall into the latter category, mostly for reasons unrelated to transportation constraints.) Not LaShaun.

Nope. LaShaun had a small hand truck stacked with plastic crates that contained all of the necessary party supplies. She sat in the front area with her son curled up next to her and the cart pulled against his seat to keep it out of the way of the aisle. During the ride, we chatted about all of her preparations for this train-themed (!) party, including the table centerpiece she constructed with old tissue boxes and toilet paper rolls. (To a woman, bus chicks are resourceful, though not all are crafty enough to create table centerpieces that look like trains. Ahem.)

When we reached our stop, LaShaun hauled the entire party off the bus (while holding her son’s hand), and started rolling it across the Seattle Center campus to our destination. A few steps in (and 15 minutes before the party was supposed to start), the supporting crate cracked, and her carefully balanced tower of supplies started to come apart. We tried putting everything back together, but the tower wouldn’t hold or stay on the hand truck. The crates were too heavy and cumbersome to carry for the significant walk to the museum.

“If we had some duct tape, you could probably just fix it,” I said, mostly just to say something. Who has duct tape?

You know what? LaShaun had duct tape. In her backpack, naturally. In less than a minute, she hoisted the crates back onto the cart and taped everything, (MacGyver-style) until it was haul-able. I grabbed the cake, the kids grabbed a few small items, and the four of us marched that stuff to its destination with time to spare.

Now let me tell you what was in those crates: snacks, drinks, party favors, the centerpiece (which was perfect), train-themed decorations, and several gifts. I took a picture of the lovely cake, which wasn’t as amazing as another transit-themed cake I told you about a few years back but certainly worked for Chicklet and me.

If I hadn’t been so sidetracked by the newborn one of the parents brought to the party (see above), I would have taken more.

Happy (early) Mother’s Day to my new bus shero.

***

* According to my husband, I also make a mean sweet potato pie, if that counts.

My kind of bus driver appreciation

Since today is all about appreciating drivers, I want to tell you guys about an idea that I’ve had for many years but have never been organized (or brave) enough to act on.

You know those firefighter calendars? The ones that feature smokin’ hot first responders lounging around the fire house conveniently missing most of their gear? Yeah, those.

We need one for bus drivers. Seriously. I mean, we’ve all seen at least one driver (or six) we we’d like to “appreciate” up close, right?

Imagine this–with bus drivers! (Photo credit: @emilyrahimi)

The calendar could be used to raise money for a transit-related nonprofit, or the ATU—shoot, for some dang bathrooms for our superheroes to use.

We’d need to find a pro bono photographer, of course. And we’d need a way to identify candidates and/or invite them to participate–other than approaching them, stalker-style, while they’re trying to do their jobs, that is. And someone would have to prevent me from giving the calendar a completely inappropriate (but hilarious) name.

But just imagine if we pulled it off!

Who’s with me? If we start now, we could definitely have it together by December.

How to pass the time at a bus stop, part VIII

Count cows.

Rebelling by bus

As I think I might have mentioned, we need a revolution in how we get around in this country, and we need it yesterday. Instead of doing something about it, our elected officials, including those who claim to understand the urgency, are doubling down on car infrastructure, ensuring that our children and grandchildren will continue to face limited, dangerous, unhealthy, and toxic transportation choices far into the future.

While we hold our collective breath waiting for the people in power to do the right thing (and also, because the air is polluted!), we ordinary, everyday folks have the ability and obligation to—ahem!—drive change. Allow me to introduce you to some folks in Thurston County who are doing just that.

Actually, come to think of it, you have probably already heard about Mary Williams and Gail Johnson, aka Rebels by Bus, two retired South Sound residents who been challenging car culture for years. I’m embarrassed to admit I just learned about them last spring. Of, course, it is also possible that I did hear about them back in 2010; parenting has destroyed my memory.

But I digress.

Here’s what my new favorite bus riders have to say about why they ride.

Global warming, world-wide financial downfall, volatile stock market, all-time high gas prices, increasing unemployment… enough to make anyone cringe and want to hibernate until things get better.

Read on… you don’t need to hibernate. Maybe you should just SLOW down?

[…]

Traveling on the bus is also a bit of a rebellion-as if by getting out of our cars, we are declaring our independence from oil and the culture that says we must rush, rush, rush around. The bus rides themselves are also a wonderful way to get a different perspective about life and the benefits of going more slowly. It is also a gentle reminder that people are helpful and friendly no matter where you go.

For some, traveling by bus is the way they get back and forth to work; they can get a lot of reading or knitting done. For others like us, traveling by bus is recreation and adventure. Like any adventure, there is the joy of figuring things out and making all the right connections. There is also a sense of resiliency when things do not go quite as planned and you have to come up with Plan B. It is a great opportunity to practice letting go of those things you cannot control.

Even in these tumultuous times, there are grand and wonderful adventures that await. Our posts are not meant to be a tour guide of the greater Puget Sound area but we do hope to provide ideas and stories that inspire you to get on that bus. Once you realize how easily you can travel to so many places without spending a lot of money, it will open up a whole new realm of fun!

I realize not everyone has the privilege to slow the pace of life, but I so appreciate these rebels, who are using their bus adventures to question the culture we have created and to develop a deeper connection to their community.

Yes, please.

On busing and bad language (or, the “s” word, according to Chicklet)

As I’ve mentioned on numerous occasions (here and here and here and here), my fellow bus riders are a creative bunch. One of the many areas through which they express their creative energy is cursing. If there were a world cursing competition, it would be held in the back of a bus. Or at a stop.

As I’ve also mentioned, the two mini bus riders with whom I travel most frequently are big talkers. And imitators.

I think you see where I’m going with this.

I am prepared to (and in fact regularly do) talk to my children about what we witness, experience, and overhear on our travels. I think of it as their opportunity to learn about the world they live in and my opportunity to teach compassion and reinforce our family’s values. Still, I have a hang-up about bad language–especially certain words–and have always been slightly fearful that my kids would join the ranks of advanced potty mouths before they even had any middle-school friends to impress.

As it turns out, it has (so far) not been an issue. Oddly, neither one of them has ever uttered a bad word—nor seemed even the slightest bit interested in those that are hurled past them with infrequent regularity. In our six and a half years of bus parenting, curse words have never come up.

Until last weekend, that is.

On Saturday, as Chicklet was sitting on the couch, obsessively reading a My Little Pony comic book, she suddenly gasped.

“Mommy, Mommy come here! Come here! This book has a BAD WORD!”

I hustled over, almost excited for an excuse to finally ban this bane from my household for good. (I have no idea why I allowed my children to be introduced to these insidious, equine, purveyors of platitudes, but I rue the day.) Looking simultaneously embarrassed, outraged, and horrified, she pointed out the offensive language:

“shut up”